Heartache to hope

KENSINGTON - Joey Cole had a gleam in his eye - and a knack for getting attention from young ladies. "How many girls at the wake said, 'I used to be Joey's girlfriend'?" recalls grandmother Fran Mosher. "About every second one," mom Shelley Smith replies, remembering him with happiness and tears. Smith finds it helpful to know that same life -the one that gave her boy charm and a gleam in his eye - continues on.

Joey Cole, 15, had been bicycling with his brother in 2002 when he was hit by a van. He later died in a Moncton hospital.

His mother, Shelley Smith, and family decided to donate his organs, which helped five people.

A 24-year-old woman and 68-year-old man got his kidneys, a 46-year-old woman needed his liver, a 46-year-old man received his pancreas, and a 51-year-old, waiting for a lung transplant, got his second chance.

"In my eyes, Joey's still alive in all these people," Smith said at a ceremony in Kensington Friday honouring families who help others through organ donation.

"It wasn't a hard decision," Smith told them.

The Pleasant Valley woman had been more familiar with the process because brother Stephen had been a donor. Stephen was in his 20s when he died from injuries after falling down stairs in 1993.

Chatting in an interview at her Kensington home, Fran Mosher said strong faith helped her deal with her son's death.

"My feeling is it was Stephen's time."

Mosher came across an organ donation pamphlet in hospital and vowed to sign up.

But she didn't think of donating Stephen's organs until a nurse suggested it.

"I figured he didn't need it, somebody else could use it."

She wondered if she'd have to convince her husband.

"Is it too late?" was all Cecil wanted to know.

The Kidney Foundation and Sun Life Financial have begun a tree-planting program to recognize organ donors and their families. It started with the ceremony and tree planting in Kensington Friday; two trees now grow in remembrance of Joey and Stephen on land beside Community Gardens.

During the ceremony, Smith and Mosher urged people to promote organ donation and discuss it with family members to ensure final wishes get carried out.

Summerside kidney recipient Brian Ellis - in the midst of a walk supporting organ and tissue donation - shared the difference organ donation has made in his life and that of his family.

"When I was a little boy I used to think heroes were hockey players and baseball players ... Now I think heroes are different - people that make a sudden change in somebody's life."

He said there were two heroes in the spirits of Joey and Stephen.

"And we have two heroes in Fran and Shelley."